Over the last decade, there has been a substantial increase in the use and deployment of network enabled client stations. These client stations may join a Layer 2 local network in which the client stations operate on the same subnet (i.e., address range). Since client stations operate using the same subnet, communications between client stations may be performed using media access control (MAC) addresses. In particular, network devices within this Layer 2 local network may use Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) requests and responses to resolve a mapping between Internet Protocol (IP) addresses and MAC addresses for client stations. Based on this mapping, client stations may communicate with each other within the local network using MAC addresses.
In some situations, the local network described above may be communicatively coupled to one or more geographically remote networks such that client stations in the local network may communicate with client stations in these remote networks. In this configuration, the local network operates on a different subnet (i.e., address range) than the remote networks. Since the local and remote networks operate on different subnets, the combined network system created by these networks may be considered a Layer 3 network. As a Layer 3 network, client stations in each of the local and remote networks communicate using intermediate routing devices instead of directly using MAC addresses as with a Layer 2 network. Accordingly, the client stations on the local network and the remote networks are in different broadcast domains and may not efficiently transmit multicast or broadcast packets in this Layer 3 network.
The approaches described in this section are approaches that could be pursued, but not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated, it should not be assumed that any of the approaches described in this section qualify as prior art merely by virtue of their inclusion in this section.